Despite cavernous plot holes and some unabashed Chinese nationalist speechifying, the spectacle of intellect thwarted in mid-flight has a moody resonance.

| Dec 19, 2022

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Nov 18, 2011

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Nov 17, 2011

We know we're in strange territory from the opening shot.

| Aug 15, 2011

Xing is surprised to discover Western academics are just as ruthless as communist apparatchiks and, ill equipped emotionally to handle humiliation, he takes his guns to town.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Jul 5, 2011

| Original Score: 1.5/5 | Apr 4, 2011

Begins with a shot of Meryl Streep practicing tai chi, and therein lies a precise encapsulation of the film's attitude toward the intersection of Eastern and Western cultures

| Aug 8, 2009

Buttressed by outstanding, unpredictable performances and a beguiling mood of raw nerve collegiate ambition, Matter develops erratically but intelligently.

| Original Score: B | Mar 25, 2009

Poignantly and sympathetically gets inside the confused head of an Asian immigrant rarely seen in film, a grad student flummoxed by American culture and academic politics.

| Original Score: 7/10 | Dec 7, 2008

| Original Score: B+ | Oct 18, 2008

The film does a fine job of displaying the contrasts between these tense, formalized Chinese students and the faux populist American academics.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 18, 2008

There is nothing wrong with taking inspiration from actual events, but it's a tricky business, and Dark Matter does no one right by sticking to the shocking conclusion.

| Original Score: 1/4 | May 2, 2008

A remarkable whisper of a movie as well, for something that deals with a subject as alarming as campus violence.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Apr 18, 2008

There is no need for a scene in which your hero loses touch with reality via cockeyed camera trickery and thumping techno music.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Apr 18, 2008

It is easy to see the film as two movies crammed together, neither of them being very good.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Apr 18, 2008

Liu Ye is too inexpressive for his role's demands, and the movie doesn't build to his downfall: It just zaps itself there.

| Original Score: C- | Apr 16, 2008

While imperfect, the high caliber of acting as well as these lucid moments in the earlier part of the film are strong and memorable highlights with which to leave the theatre.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Apr 14, 2008

Written by Billy Shebar and directed by opera director Chen Shi-Zheng, this visually sophisticated film has been criticized for turning a deeply disturbed individual into a "hero," but nothing could be further from the truth.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Apr 11, 2008

There's little in Billy Shebar's script, the rambling direction by theater and opera helmer Chen Shi-Zheng - or Liu Ye's impassive performance as the student.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Apr 11, 2008

Director Chen Shi-Zheng's film has a graceful energy, and three strong performances help make this serene drama - and its shocking conclusion - quietly moving.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Apr 11, 2008